


Varicella Spatium Virus

by prettybirdy979



Category: Guardians of the Galaxy (Movies)
Genre: Gen, Hidden Talents, Team Bonding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-16
Updated: 2014-09-16
Packaged: 2018-02-17 15:13:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,863
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2314040
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/prettybirdy979/pseuds/prettybirdy979
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>War of the Worlds had it right- it's not humanity's actions you've gotta worry about. </p>
<p>It's their ability to survive diseases that'll be the problem.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Varicella Spatium Virus

**Author's Note:**

> For the kinkmeme prompt [ here](http://guardian-kink.livejournal.com/1806.html?thread=737038#t737038). Not my first fill on the kinkmeme but the first one I've claimed...
> 
> Hope it's alright.

‘Message from Nova Prime.’ Peter drops into a seat at what is currently acting as a dining room table- he’s fairly sure ten minutes ago it was a bunch of boxes of ammunition but he’s choosing to ignore that fact and pretend the sheet is actually working- and looks around at his fellow Guardians.

‘Another milk run?’ Rocket is fiddling with something as he absentmindedly eats. Peter is also ignoring that; the no bombs at the table rule hadn’t even lasted a week. ‘We going to go to some poor planet and wipe kids noses again?’

‘That was one time!’

‘Yeah, and it paid shit.’

Drax looks up from his meal. ‘We were not paid in shit.’

Peter tries not to roll his eyes. Sometimes he’s sure Drax is doing this on purpose. ‘Metaphor buddy.’ He waits for Drax’s uncertain nod before he continues. ‘But this is better. Recovery mission.’

‘Oh sure, a recovery mission is going to be so much better.’

‘I am Groot.’ The treeman says from his seat, where he’s once again trying to escape his pot. Gamora, who is walking past with her own breakfast, pushes him back down into it and no one comments on Rocket’s small- and possibly grateful- nod.

‘No, you don’t get an opinion. Especially not one that agrees with him!’

‘Perhaps if we knew more Quill?’ Gamora asks as she sits down. ‘What do they need?’

He knew he liked Gamora best for a reason. Other than her being incredibly hot. ‘Simple check in and pick up. They’ve lost contact with a base two clicks from the Outer Rim. We’re to go see why and grab the data disc with the last month’s logs from the main station.’

‘Sounds simple enough.’ But even as she speaks, Gamora’s eyes are considering. She opens her mouth to speak.

‘How much?’ Rocket cuts her off but her nod indicates that was probably what she was going to ask.

‘Hundred thousand units for the check up. Fifty thousand more if we manage the retrieval.’ Everyone exchanges worried looks and Peter knows what they’re thinking. ‘Yeah, I know it’s high-’

‘Too high. They’re not telling us something.’

‘I am Groot.’ Peter doesn’t need Rocket to translate to know Groot is agreeing with his friend.

‘I know guys! But it’s the first decent paying job we’ve had in weeks that’s even _slightly_  legal and it’s _us_. We can do anything.’

The rest of his team gives Peter incredulous looks but Gamora’s is considering and Rocket has that greedy glint in his eye.

They’ll do it, Peter’s sure of it.

*********

‘Nova Base, this is the Milano. Do you copy?’

Still no response. Gamora and Peter exchange worried looks while Rocket goes back to fiddling with the Milano’s long range scanners, trying to improve them. They started hailing the base the moment they might have been in range and they’re now gotten close enough to see it without a single sign of life.

‘Nova Base, this is the Milano. We’re here under orders from Nova Prime; authorisation Nova One Nine Six Nine stroke Two Zero Zero Eight.’ Still nothing and Peter takes a deep breath. ‘Nova Base, this is the Milano. Please respond.’

‘Quill, you might wanna stop that hailing.’ Rocket’s eyes are wide as he reads whatever is on his screen.

‘You got something?’ Peter tries to look over at the screen while still maintaining control of the Milano.

‘Life signs.’ And Rocket sounds utterly defeated, so much so that Peter stops the Milano as fast as is possible so he can see the screen too. ‘About a dozen. But...’

‘What is it?’ Drax is shaking his head sadly and Gamora has buried her face in her hands. This has got to be bad. Especially as Peter is quite sure Nova Prime said the Base was staffed by over fifty people.

‘Message being broadcast faintly on the emergency channel.’ Rocket huffed. ‘Because instead of sticking it on all channels, these idiots stick it on the one channel that’s broadcast by a short range transmitter.’ He rolls his eyes. ‘It’s like they don’t want people to hear it.’

‘Perhaps they didn’t want people to hear it.’ Gamora offers.

‘What message is it?’ Peter will swear his voice doesn’t squeak in outrage. ‘I’m not flying my ship so I can see it, so can I see the message?’

‘Geez, no need to be rude about it.’ Rocket swipes at a screen and brings up and unmutes the message.

A young Xandarian, still wearing her Nova Corps uniform, appears on screen. Below her face, a subtitle identifies her as Corpsman Teil.

‘This is emergency protocol 13. There has been a base wide quarantine declared. I repeat, this is emergency protocol 13, we’ve declared a base wide quarantine.’ She looks the camera dead on. ‘We have a dozen confirmed cases of the Varicella spatium virus.’

‘Varicella spatium virus?’ Peter whispers over the Xandarian’s repeat of her message.

‘Space pox.’

‘Oh right.’ Suddenly the entire situation is crystal clear to Peter. ‘How old is this message?’

‘Three days old.’

‘Space Pox truly is a fast acting disease.’

‘Don’t I know it.’ Peter mutters, gripping the edge of Rocket’s seat so he doesn’t try and scratch at his scars. That had been one hell of a month.

The others give him weird looks. ‘What?’ Gamora finally asks.

Peter shakes his head. ‘Look, plan of attack-’

‘There’s a plan of attack other than ‘Run away and tell the Nova Corps their base is a goner?’’ Rocket glares at Peter. ‘Because that’s the only plan I’m voting for.’

‘I am Groot.’

‘Right!’

‘Hey, I’m not saying you have to go down there!’

‘Good.’ Everyone nods in agreement with Rocket, even Groot.

‘I’ll go alone.’

‘What?’ The outraged roars of the rest of the Guardians is almost a wall of sound, though Peter does notice that Gamora and Drax’s voices are the clearest. Or loudest. Same difference.

‘You are not going down there. You’ll _die_.’

‘Gamora is right, the disease would kill you.’

‘I didn’t figure you for suicidal Quill.’

‘I am Groot.’

Peter has to roll his eyes at their overreaction. ‘Relax, it’ll be fine. I’ve had Space Pox before.’

He leaves the cockpit, ignoring the confused ‘What?’s behind him. And one… two… thre-

Drax grabs him and turns him to face them and their matching looks of bewilderment. ‘You cannot have had Space Pox before. You are still alive.’

‘Well, yeah I kinda noticed I’m still alive. But seriously guys, it’ll be fine. I had Space Pox when I was a kid, you can’t get it again.’

‘Yeah, that’s because after you catch it you’re _dead_.’ Rocket hisses. ‘You can’t honestly think we’ll believe you survived a round with the galaxy’s most deadly disease.’

Hang on. ‘Aren’t Andorian Shingles deadlier?’ It takes a moment but Gamora nods. ‘Thought so. The Ravagers wouldn’t come near me for a month after I got those. And I’d just spent a month on a moon in quarantine!’

Oh those are very wide eyes looking at him. Even Groot is managing a wide eyed and disbelieving look. Peter shrugs. ‘Things like that don’t kill me.’

‘Prove it.’ Rocket says and Peter stands up taller, ignoring the angry looks of Drax and Gamora.

********

They beam him down to the base, using the newly installed system that Rocket’s been tinkering with since Xandar. Well, it’s not exactly beaming him down really; it’s a kind of tractor beam but Peter likes to think of it as being like that show his mother had loved. Even if most of what they said about the universe was wrong.

It’s clear no one believes Peter, and he resents the big-ass suit they’ve forced him into as protection. He didn’t even realise they _had_ until Rocket had dug it up. And Gamora had forced him into it.

‘Just get the data and get out of there.’

‘I know, I know. This is _my_  plan!’ Peter nudges open a door and carefully steps over the body behind it. This is definitely feeling like that month on that moon with Andorian Shingles. They’d been bodies there too. He’d taken to hiding in the vents, as much as a thirteen year old could.

‘Where are you Quill? Trackers-’

‘You did not put a tracker on me.’

He can hear Rocket’s grin. ‘Course not. I put it in the suit.’

Peter groans and keeps moving. It only takes a few minutes to move down the empty corridors to the control centre of the base which is as deserted as the rest of the place. Quickly he attaches a device of Rocket’s making to the screen and watches as the information is downloaded and uploaded to the Milano’s server in one fast minute.

‘You should sell these Rocket. We’d make a fortune.’

‘You mean, _I'd_ make a fortune.’

‘Same difference.’ Peter pokes at the screen a second then looks up. He flinches as he sees a reflection in the blackened screen above him.

‘Teil.’ He whispers as he turns to look at the poor Xandarian who’d sent the cry for help. She’s covered in lumps, much like Peter had been when he’d gotten this. Only she didn’t live to see them go down.

Suddenly she opens her eyes and he jumps back, knocking his head into the screen. Peter hears the hiss of air that means there’s a tear in the suit and he groans.

‘You shouldn’t have come.’ She whispers, frightened eyes on him. ‘It’s not safe.’

Peter shrugs and removes his helmet. It’s not going to be much help anyway. He ignores the sounds of his team protesting over their communicator. ‘It’s okay, I’ll be fine.’

But Teil has lost consciousness and Peter sighs. He’d like to stay with her but he does have a mission. So instead he moves her carefully, so she is lying down but out of the way of anything. Just in case.

‘Okay guys, I’ve got it. Let’s get out of here.’

*********

Decontamination is a horrible experience and Peter hates it with a passion.

It’s even worse on Xandar than it was with the Ravagers. The Ravagers didn’t include so many blood tests that he’s sure he’s only to faint from blood loss if nothing else.  

‘Peter?’ Gamora pokes her head into his room after the doctors had _finally_ declared him healthy and Space Pox free.

‘Finally! Here to spring me?’

‘I do not understand. How would we make you a season?’ Drax asks, a step behind Gamora.

Peter sighs. ‘Expression Drax. Can I go?’

‘Free to go.’ Rocket sounds annoyed as he jumps onto Peter’s bed in a practiced motion. He eyes Peter. ‘And here I thought Terrans were useless.’

‘Hey!’

Rocket continues as if Peter hadn’t spoken. ‘But then it turns out you lot are basically invulnerable freaks. Nice going.’

Peter rolls his eyes and swipes his leg at Rocket, trying to knock him off the bed. Rocket dodges the leg with a laugh and it quickly turns into either a major fight or a good game. One of the two.

Drax ends the fight by sitting on Peter’s legs. It’s just like normal really.

 


End file.
